StreetFilms

Over the last four years, New York City has seen a transportation renaissance on its streets, striking a better balance by providing more space for walking, biking, and transit.

On a grey, chilly Sunday, an estimated 750 people, many of them on training wheels and balance bikes, turned out to ride the Prospect Park West bike lane and show their support for the traffic-calming redesign. Since the two-way, separated bike path debuted last summer, it's become indispensable for many parents who use it to take their children to school and get around the neighborhood. On weekends, the lane is full of families heading to the green market at Grand Army Plaza and kids riding to Prospect Park.

What's the most effective way to make city streets safer? As Chicago Alderman Mary Ann Smith told Streetfilms, "Signs don't do the job, even having police officers on the corner does not do the job." To prevent traffic injuries and deaths, you need to change how the street functions and make it feel slower for drivers. You need traffic calming.

Guangzhou is one of the fastest growing cities in the world. The economic hub of China's southern coast, it has undergone three decades of rapid modernization, and until recently the city’s streets were on a trajectory to get completely overrun by traffic congestion and pollution. But Guangzhou has started to change course. Last year the city made major strides to cut carbon emissions and reclaim space for people, launching new bus rapid transit and public bike sharing systems.

Just in the nick of time, as the congestion pricing debate heats up again in Los Angeles, our friends at Streetfilms released Moving Beyond the Automobile: Congestion Pricing.  The value of Streetfilms could hardly be better illustrated than by comparing "MBA: Congestion Pricing" to this piece by KTLA on the same issue. Here's a hint, the KTLA piece doesn't even mention the idea of creating a "congestion free lane of traffic."